Book about organizations and responsibility by Johan Sandstrom

It is easy to talk about CSR, corporate social responsibility and environmental responsibility. But what responsibility does organizations take in practice? And is it even possible for organizations to take responsibility?

It is one of the issues discussed in Organization and responsibility: how organizational processes impedes responsibility-taking. The book is written by Johan Sandström, professor of business administration at LTU and Tommy Jensen, professor of business administration at Stockholm University.

In the book they criticize the research around organizations and the public debate where one rather discuss the organizations' legitimacy and confidence than their responsibilities. It may rather be that legitimate and established processes within organizations discourage or undermine the responsibility of the individual.

These processes are presented in the book, along with suggestions on how to handle them and ways to move forward. The goal is to make a clear link between the organization and responsibilities, and to analyze why an expanded responsibility is so difficult.

– In Sweden we have laws and rules that work pretty well. But everything is getting more and more globalized, both production and consumption. Our goods are often produced under conditions that would be illegal in Sweden, but we still buy these things, says Johan Sandström.

– We live our lives in large organizations and various social contexts affect how we act. Our analysis are somewhat pessimistic, since there are many obstacles. If you as an individual would like to step forward and take responsibility, it requires quite a lot from you - but it is possible, says Johan Sandström.

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